Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Missy Parkin will be one of the featured professional
bowlers competing with celebrities in the Chris Paul PBA League All-Star event
airing on Superbowl Sunday, February 3rd at 4pm EST on ESPN.

Missy teams up with NBA All-Star and Slam Dunk Champion Blake Griffin of the Los Angeles Clippers, in the eight-team Shootout competition. This marks the
first time that a female professional bowler has competed in the Chris Paul
Celebrity Charity event since its inception five years ago.

Monday, January 21, 2013

This week, I travelled to my favorite country abroad- Japan, to compete in the DHC International Bowling Championships at Inazawa Grand Bowl, just outside of Nagoya, Japan. Inazawa
Grand Bowl is the largest bowling center in the world, spanning 116 lanes
straight across.

Inazawa Grand Bowl

The trip was very eventful right from the start. My travel
day to Nagoya was very long, stressful and scary at times. I was traveling with
my best friend Scott Norton and we thought that we were booked on all of the same
flights through to Narita airport in Tokyo. However, upon a late arrival into
San Francisco and a brisk walk to our connecting flight to Tokyo, we realized
that we were not on the same flight.

So splitting paths, I quickly boarded my plane for my nice
10 ½hr flight to Tokyo (minus a personal TV in the headrest in front of me…NOT
happy!) To make matters worse, the flight was then extended another hour due to
horrific turbulence upon arrival into Tokyo.

We circled the airport and attempted to land two different
times before successfully landing on the 3rd attempt. Side not…I’m
not a nervous flier and I was pretty scared and started saying some prayers... Then we finally landed to find that Narita airport was covered in a winter
wonderland with blizzard-like conditions. Another 45 minutes crawling to our
gate and then we finally were able to get off of the plane.

The airport was a zoo with flights delayed, immigration
lines incredibly long and everyone trying to get somewhere in a hurry, with
little success. I couldn’t get ahold of Scott, whom I hoped had also landed
safely in the mess outside. Finally after getting through immigration, getting
my bags, going through customs, getting lost in finding the rebooking area
(since my flight to Nagoya had been cancelled), I finally rebooked my ticket
and was only told “hurry” to get to my next flight.

Running through another airport, getting through security
and finding the bus to my gate and plane, I finally arrived as one of the last
people to board the last flight of the night to Nagoya. Thank goodness as soon
as I got on that flight, I saw Scott.

That was just the first of many crazy events on this trip to
Japan.

Scott didn’t receive any of his bags and the airline had no
idea where they were (which is always a good thing.) So long story short, that
next day, the only way for Scott to get his bowling balls and lugagge in time
to actually compete in the tournament was for him to take a bullet train back and forth from Nagoya to Narita airport in
Tokyo (which is 265 miles away.)Taking the Shinkansen or bullet train is NOT cheap in Japan, so I was
not able to go with Scott to help him out. Luckily our very amazing and helpful
friend Mr. Noda met Scott in Narita and helped him sort everything out. He
arrived back at the hotel with all of his bowling balls and luggage around 11pm that night.

The next day, Day 3 of our trip, I watched Scott bowl the
qualifiers. I had been invited to the tournament and was therefore seeded into
the main event. Scott successfully qualified on his first attempt but bowled
another squad for practice, while I practiced for about 2 ½hrs trying to work
out some kinks.

The next day, we had the official practice session followed
by the opening ceremonies and then started our first block of qualifying.
Qualifying consisted of 9 games, in sets of 3-game blocks. Then the field was
cut to the top 24 players and then another 6 games were bowled to determine the
top 5 stepladder finalists for the TV show.

I had a VERY rough start to say the least. I played the
lanes incorrectly, missed some easy spares, left a couple pocket 7-10s and just
simply didn’t throw the ball well. Meanwhile, the rest of the field was
shooting 300 like it was nothing and the scoring pace was extremely high. I dug
a HUGE hole for myself, shooting -67 with the cut being around +70. So needless to say, not a good start. The only good thing about the day was that afterwards, Mr. Noda graciously took Scott and I out for some yummy Shabu Shabu, which is raw meat cooked in boiling water with vegetables - my favorite!

Mr. Noda preparing our shabu shabu

After talking with others that scored well, thinking about
things I didn’t try and just re-evaluating everything, I made some major
adjustments for the next day. Needing two big sets, I started out with a 233,
followed by a clean 192 (never missing the pocket) and then shot 239 to be -3
overall. They didn’t re-oil for the next set and I needed a big set to make the
cut.

Changing hand positions and opening up the lanes, I shot 244
and 247, putting me at +88 going into the last game. I needed one more big game to make the cut, and then I hit a bad pair. Starting out with a
double and then leaving a pocket 7-10, it was all downhill from there and I
missed the cut to the top 24, which ended up taking +135.

I will say that I was especially impressed with 14-year-old Japanese youngster, Shion Izumune who nearly made the championship TV show. She did, however, qualify for the trios event representing Japan.

Shion Izumune and I

Immediately after getting done with my final game, I was heading over to see how
Scott was bowling (the guys took a lot longer to bowl each block and were
therefore still bowling), when Kelly Kulick ran up to me and said “Missy, Scott
is looking for you, he wants to go to the hospital.” Being completely stunned
and in shock, I quickly ran over to his pair to find out what was going on. He
looked like a ghost and was still attempting to bowl his 2nd game of the block.

He quit after that game and I with the help of our friends
and the staff of the tournament, rushed him to the nearest hospital. Thankfully
we were seen fairly quickly and he was super dehydrated and needed an IV for an
hour and received some medicine. He got his color back and slept for the next
13hrs once we got back to the hotel.

Thankfully that was the end of the craziness. The next day,
Scott was much better and we went to watch the TV show and attended the farewell
party.

Big congratulations to Shayna Ng from Singapore and Tommy
Jones who won the tournament.

Tommy Jones during the title match

Although this was a very short, yet eventful trip and
definitely the worst I’ve ever bowled in Japan (prior worst finish being 6th),
I still enjoyed seeing all of my friends and eating yummy Japanese food. I just
hope that it’s not too long before I venture back to my favorite country
abroad!

Missy first made
Team USA as a senior in high school, being the youngest to qualify for the
adult team in 2000. She was also a member of Team USA in 2001 and 2008. Missy
also became the first ever Junior Gold National Champion, winning the inaugural
event in 1998 and making Junior Team USA in 1999, 2000 and 2001.

Team USA 2008

Missy first
represented Team USA in 1998, at age 16 in the FIQ American Zone Junior
championships (now PABCON Youth American Zone) in Guatemala City, Guatemala
where she won a gold medal in Team event and a bronze medal in doubles.

She later went
on to represent the United States on the adult team in the FIQ American Zone
championships in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 2001. She earned a gold medal in
team event, where she anchored the team, striking out in the 10th frame of the
final game to secure the team gold medal. She also earned a gold medal in the
trios event.

Team USA trials
were conducted at Sunset Station in Henderson, NV. The tournament was comprised
of five 6-game blocks, each block bowled on a different oil pattern. After five
days of bowling, the top three men and women based on ranking points
automatically made Team USA. Then two other bowlers were selected from Team USA
Trials and an additional five bowlers were selected based on resumes.

Each day,
bowlers received ranking points based on their finish in that day's
competition. High qualifier for the day received one point, second for the day,
two points etc. The object being to accumulate the least amount of points as
possible.

Missy earned 16
points, 2 points and 2 points for the first three days of competition putting
her in 2nd position overall. However, in day four, Missy struggled coming in
61st for the day and dropped significantly in the standings. Missy came back
strong on day five, the final day of competition, for a 10th place finish and
overall was ranked 11th in the standings in ranking points and 4th overall in
total pinfall.

Missy is
extremely excited to be a part of the prestigious Team USA program again and
looks forward to Team USA training camp as well as the possibility of
representing Team USA in international competitions this year!